Currently, connections between different types of networks are mostly connections between heterogeneous networks. Different types of base stations are deployed in a heterogeneous network. To improve throughput of a radio communications system and reduce load of a cell serving a user equipment, the user equipment needs to discover, by means of search and measurement, an appropriate neighboring cell to perform cell handover.
In a cell discovery method in the prior art, the user equipment starts, according to an instruction from a serving base station, large-scale search and measurement blindly on cells of other base stations; then discovers an appropriate neighboring cell; and after performing signal measurement on the discovered neighboring cell, determines whether to perform cell handover.
In a process of implementing the cell discovery, the user equipment needs to blindly perform large-scale search, and this is very power-consuming.